State report rips prison for failing to prevent escape

Notes left by Richard Matt in his cell prior to his escape from Clinton Correctional Facility on June 6, 2015.

ALBANY — One year to the day that a pair of convicted killers broke out of Clinton Correctional Facility and led authorities on a three-week manhunt, the state Inspector General’s office released a scathing report on Monday detailing the conditions that led to the escape.

General Catherine Leahy Scott skewered the overall operating culture of the prison in the long-awaited report.

The report chalked the escape of inmates Richard Matt and David Sweat up to the “chronic complacency” and “systemic failures” of security procedures at Clinton Correctional in Dannemora.

“The extent of complacency and failure to adhere to the most basic security standards uncovered by my investigation was egregious and inexcusable,” said Scott.

David Sweat and Richard Matt

The 154-page report traced how the inmates manipulated employees into giving them the tools that facilitated their escape, which they then used to cut through cell walls, carve a hole in a steam pipe, slither through the bowels of the prison and break through a concrete wall with a found sledgehammer before emerging through a manhole outside the walls of the prison.

“Over the course of approximately 85 nights that Sweat was working in the tunnels under the prison, more than 400 inmate bed checks should have occurred, any one of which, if conducted properly, would have detected Sweat’s absence and instantly foiled the escape plot,” read the report.

The findings, which included testimony from 170 witnesses, painted a damning portrait of a culture of neglect in the prison, where lapses in basic security were described as “longstanding,” allowing the pair to escape “almost in plain sight.”

Prior to the breakout on June 6, the first in over a century, correction officers regularly cut corners, declining to search cells, conduct night counts and perform the searches of employees’ bags that would have likely led to the confiscation of the contraband the pair used to escape the facility.

Photo: NYS Office of the Governor

Hole in rear wall of Matt’s cell accessing the catwalk the inmates used to gain access to the interior of the facility

Two employees were arrested in connection with the incident.

The report described the relationship the inmates cultivated with Joyce Mitchell, the civilian employee who supervised the pair at the prison’s sewing shop, and a guard, Gene Palmer, to obtain the tools and privileges needed to execute the plan, which was hatched in January 2015.

Palmer, a long-term employee who referred to himself as a "go-to guy," developed a close relationship with the two inmates, both of whom lived on the honor block he was tasked with guarding.

Photo: NYS Police

Sweat created this painting for Palmer, which the guard discarded in the woods near his home following the escape

The relationship appeared to go far deeper than what many correction officers who spoke in the veteran guard's defense argued was a necessary part of keeping the lid on an simmering and hostile environment.

Sweat and Matt, both talented artists, created elaborate paintings in exchange for prison intelligence (which prison brass later testified wasn't useful or particularly reliable) and special privileges, including access to the catwalk behind their cells.

Palmer granted the access so Sweat could re-wire circuitry to allow for higher-amperage hotplates, which inmates used to cook food. But the prisoner also used the time behind the walls to map out the pair’s future escape route.

Both inmates were allowed to bypass metal detectors — Matt would often be transported from the workshop indirectly by way of the infirmary, where he would be requested to be taken for "back pain" — and helped facilitate Sweat in his reassignment back to the tailor shop from the prison library, where he was temporarily exiled for making "inappropriate comments."

Photo: NYS Inspector General's Office

The tailor shop platform from which Joyce Mitchell supervised Matt and Sweat

Palmer tipped Matt off to cell searches and helped aid Sweat's relocation to a cell next to Matt, where they worked on their escape plan, passing tools back and forth and refining their strategy to manipulate Mitchell, who by then, had developed a deep infatuation with both.

The guard's relationship was so close with Matt, the guard testified, that the inmate had vowed to kill any inmate who assaulted him.

Officers also failed to properly conduct at least 15 required weekly inspections of “cell integrity” to include examination of bars, floors, vents, walls, and rear of the cell from the catwalks.

Palmer, in fact, testified that officers on occasion would “forge” reports falsely indicating that searches had occurred and no contraband uncovered.

“These inspections, if performed as required, would have revealed the breaches in the walls of Sweat’s and Matt’s cells," read the report.

Even the searches that were executed were flawed.

An inspection of Matt’s cell about 10 weeks before the escape, for instance, failed to find the 18" x 14" cut using the hacksaw blades and a screwdriver bit smuggled in by Mitchell.

Gene Palmer

Even more damning is that DOCCS' central office failed to approve a lockdown requested just one week before the breakout by the prison's now-deposed superintendent, Steve Racette.

DOCCS internal affairs division also failed to uncover an inappropriate relationship between Mitchell and Sweat despite repeated documented allegations, including an incident that resulted in a write-up in September 2014, just seven months before the escape.

"As noted, based on past experience, supervisors were reluctant to bring charges against, or even reprimand, Mitchell for such behavior," read the report. "To do so, they feared, would likely provoke claims of harassment from Mitchell and possibly from her husband, Lyle Mitchell, as well."

All told, monitoring and inspection programs failed to detect what the report referred to as "security deficiencies."

Once Sweat successfully cut through his cell wall, he spent weeks searching for an escape route, returning each morning looking visibly "frail and exhausted," according to Mitchell's supervisor.

“[I]t felt good, because you kind of felt free," Sweat testified. "You know, you weren’t caged up in the cell no more. Nobody knew where you were. I always left my ID in my cell, you know, when I left the cell, so I didn’t feel like I was an inmate anymore. It gave me that little feel of freedom because whenever I left my cell, on a normal basis, I always had my ID. And it was different for me, you know, after 14 years, or 13, or whatever it’s been. It was something new, it was doing something that I could actually use my mind for, that I could apply myself to.”

David Sweat

After discovering a toolbox left behind by a contractor, Sweat convinced Mitchell to smuggle in additional tools, including the concrete bits necessary to operate a power drill, which she promptly delivered within days (But much to the inmate’s chagrin, the contractor later retrieved the box before Sweat could use the device).

Sweat continued to work. After sketching out an escape route, the inmate cut through a chain securing a manhole cover, popped his head up and surveyed the landscape:

Perfect.

Sweat preferred the spot because it was out-of-sight of two guard towers, shaded by a copse of leafy trees. But, as the report noted, it didn't matter because neither had been staffed at night for decades.

Photo: NYS Police

Tools left behind by Sweat in the tunnel included chisels, a punch, hacksaw blade pieces and drill bits, left unused after a contractor retrieved a toolbox from behind prison walls

After a three-week manhunt throughout some of the most challenging terrain in the country, Matt, 49, was fatally shot by a federal agent on June 26 about 27 miles away from the prison.

Sweat, 35, was captured two days later about 2 miles from the Canadian border.

Mitchell, who backed out of a plan to serve as a getaway driver, was sentenced to 2-1/3 to seven years in state prison in September and ordered to pay $80,000 in restitution costs. Palmer pled guilty to promoting prison contraband and was sentenced to six months in county jail, and ordered to pay a $5,000 fine, in February.

Sweat was sentenced 3 1/2 to 7 years on top of his lifetime sentence for killing a Broome County Sheriff's deputy in 2002.

Three high-ranking officials, including Racette, were terminated in the aftermath of the escape, as were nine other staffers.

And Lyle, also a civilian employee at the prison, appears to be sticking by his wife. If given the chance, he said he would "probably not" tip off prison management about his wife's inappropriate behavior, instead placing blame on front gate security staff for not inspecting bags.

The report also appeared to put the kibosh on a broader conspiracy.

For instance, Scott instructed staffers to cut through a 18” steam pipe using similar tools. They did so in two hours. A similar test to cut through a 3/16-inch-thick steel plate that served as their cell walls was completed in less than four hours.

Sweat used hacksaw blades to cut through this steam pipe.

As part of the report's findings, Scott issued a number of recommendations to safeguard against another incident, which terrified the region and led to overtime costs upwards of $23 million.

Among the tightening up the procedural gaps that led to the escape, Scott announced the creation of a specialized team within her office to “independently audit and monitor adherence to statewide and facility specific operations policies and procedures across all correctional facilities in the state.”

Since last June, DOCCS has instituted a number of reforms to “strengthen operations” at Clinton Correctional, including installing new cameras and security gates, retraining staff, disciplining responsible employees, appointing a new superintendent and replacing other senior administrative personnel, said Thomas Bailey, a DOCCS spokesman.

“We are reviewing the Inspector General’s findings and will work with her office to implement her recommendations to improve operations at Clinton and throughout the entire system, and help ensure this incident is never repeated,” Bailey said.

Photo: NYS Police

"I grabbed the sheet and I almost threw up, then saw the
dummy," recalled Ronald Blair, the guard who discovered Matt and Sweat's absence on the morning of June 6, 2015